


The Lion in Spring

by Ophelia_Raine



Series: An Anthology of Kisses [5]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Office, Alternate Universe - Westeros, Angst and Fluff and Smut, F/M, Kissing, May/December Relationship, Older Man/Younger Woman, the power of suggestion
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-24
Updated: 2019-05-15
Packaged: 2020-01-25 16:31:58
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 12,400
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18578296
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ophelia_Raine/pseuds/Ophelia_Raine
Summary: When Tywin loses his head one spring morning and kisses the new intern in a glass elevator, little does he realise how his life will change.A story about the private charms of a May-December office romance.





	1. Elevator

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is cobbled together from 30 kissing prompts out of [a list of 76](https://0pheliaraine.tumblr.com/post/174454333860/prompt-list).

 

[ ](https://www.flickr.com/photos/162326344@N04/47641785412/in/dateposted-public/)

His stare is turning into a scowl, but she doesn't seem in the least affected. Her head is bent slightly now and she stares at her long, pale fingers, nonchalantly inspecting her perfectly even manicure before turning to gaze at the view beyond them. Ordinarily, his elevator shoots up the 950 feet of glass, steel and concrete at ear-popping speed, unimpeded by other passengers stopping to alight. 

Now there's the two of them. The Old Lion himself and this chit of a girl who either doesn't know where she's wandered into, or else doesn't care.

Tywin Lannister replays the recent moments in his mind. He remembers the elevator arriving, the pressing crowds obediently stepping back so that he and he alone may enter the glass cavity. He remembers swiping his card and pressing the top floor. He remembers the door closing, and then the jolt as a slim hand darts between the sensors. And then she enters the lift with him, the doors closing behind her softly so they are trapped for 64 storeys. 

He recognises her instantly, of course. Ned's girl, the older one. Stark, Sansa. Eddard heads up the operation in North Westeros and there had been some sort of arrangement about his girl learning the ropes at Headquarters. And so here she's been, the last month or so. 

Ordinarily, she is meek and mild, eager to please, and entirely too earnest and wet behind the ears. Or so he tells himself often, noting again the large black silk knot nestled at the hollow of her pale throat, the fit of the white Yi Ti silk over young, high breasts and the austere, business-like auburn bun pulled tight and low at the nape of her neck. Her skirt is long and narrow, and stops demurely at her knees. Her nude stockings are stretched taut over legs that go on and on, ending in heels that are delicate, elegant, but still oddly practical. 

And then the air in the elevator grows stuffy and still, and Tywin narrows his eyes as he follows her gaze out to the city where the sun is still rising.

"And to think, all this is yours," she murmurs suddenly, quietly and to herself but he hears every word as if each had tickled his ear.

"In essence, yes," he affirms.

"Did it take long?"

"No."

"Will you—"

He will never know the end of that sentence. Instead, he steps forward and in one dizzying moment, finds his arm snaking around her little waist before he pulls her roughly to him. Something like a snarl slips unbidden from his throat before he covers his mouth over hers, sinking himself into her. Against his will, he finds her tongue, newly sweetened with strawberries. Against his will, he groans into her mouth even as she sighs into him. Against his will, he pushes her against the cold curved glass wall and drinks her in thirstily even as the lift flies now, faster and faster, King's Landing but a blur as the cityscape slips past behind them.

Vaguely, he hears the doors open, vaguely he feels more people coming in. And still he kisses her, just as she kisses him back ardently, her arms snaking around his neck, her body melting into his. And still more people are coming in. Tywin feels them stop and stare and still he does not, cannot let her go. _Let them stare,_ he growls to himself. _I don't give a fuck._ And yet he must do, for he feels the familiar roil within himself, a tightening down low. He brushes his length against her greedily and finds her dampness, even through the layers of business cotton, of soft wool, of spun rayon and silk. Faintly, he hears a scatter of disapproving gasps in the elevator and it is his final undoing. He comes, spilling into the wool of his pants, hearing her pant into his ear as he finally tears his mouth away, as he buries his face into her neck, her hair, as he groans his climax, as he—

Wakes up in his bed, a thin sheen of perspiration coating skin. Tywin had kicked off the covers and it was just as well, for he had come all over his chest like a horny, hairless boy. The air is oppressively still, apart the ragged breaths, the rise and fall of his chest which he wills now to slow. Miraculously, he thinks he can still faintly taste strawberries. The clock beside him is an hour away from sunrise but he knows there won't be any sleep now. 

Tywin Lannister. Kissing an intern in the wettest dream he's had in years. He stares up at the vaulted ceiling and glares at the gods. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Artwork in the top-left box is by Jan McMurtry Arnold, titled "Lion On Spring".
> 
> This chapter is inspired by Prompt #33 — Kiss in a dream.


	2. Customary

[ ](https://www.flickr.com/photos/162326344@N04/46779307205/in/dateposted-public/)

He does not spare the morning throng in the lobby a backward glance as he strides toward his private elevator, already open and waiting for him. While the common lifts sit outside the newly opened Lannister Tower and glide up and down the length of the skyscraper like floating hourglasses, Tywin's private lift is keyed to his fingerprints and patrician mien, and sealed off from the rest of the world while it shoots him skyward to his office among the clouds. 

It would be ridiculous. Ridiculous and impossible for a mere Marketing intern like Sansa to wander into this capsule after him. To find herself trapped in this windowless bullet with no circumstantial chaperones. And so she doesn't, of course she doesn't. And Tywin ignores what he feels about that.  

It takes an hour for him to sink deep into his work. Another hour before he's reminded of that blasted benefit gala on tonight, the one that is supposed to double up as a staff dinner to boost morale (sneer). Three-thousand guests squeezed into the biggest convention hall that King's Landing could offer. Frightful affair, but it's black tie tonight which means Tywin has to excoriate someone for forgetting to anticipate his needs. He leaves his latest Executive Assistant — he's forgotten her name again — near tears after coolly questioning her competence. Women and their infernal waterworks.  

It takes another half hour to accidentally learn that the interns are not expected to attend as well. Space issues. A quick call to Marketing, and a few exceptions are drily made. Another morale-boosting undertaking that was apparently met with squeals, and it does not surprise him when he learns that Sansa now has to find a dress. 

It takes an interminably longer time to stop thinking about the dress. 

* * *

A sea of round tables separate them, and rightly so. He’s seated front and centre, nearest to the stage. And she, she is shunted to the side of the massive room along with a table of fatuous young women. She’s lucky if she can catch half the evening’s entertainment from there. 

Luck has nothing to do with how he can watch her calmly from _here_ , however.   

The cobalt blue of Sansa's gown sets off the dark copper of her hair and he wonders what the colour of her eyes are. Green? Blue, like her dress? He grips the satin under-tablecloth tightly, feeling how it bunches in his hands. It’s but a pale imitation of raw silk which her dress is almost certainly made of. Would he be gentle, he wonders. Would he coax her dress from her pale, lithe body? Take his time with it from neckline to nave? Or would he rip the damn thing off, as if were mere paper taffeta… 

The current clown on stage gives an effusive introduction and he grimaces his distaste even as he rises to his feet now. Tywin Lannister, CEO chucks his napkin on the table, all eyes on him as he pushes his chair back in. The roving stage light is already centred on his powerfully tall, lean frame but his back is to the room when he glances over to Miss Stark’s table only to lock eyes with the lass, the vixen herself in arresting blue. 

The rest of the room fades instantly, and the glare of the roving light seems brighter now, pointed. They stare mutely even as the air between them starts to thicken and slow. One moment too damnably long, and then he turns and makes his way to the stage as if she were nothing but a momentary distraction. 

Later, he stands like a fool at the main exit, shaking hands with the hoi polloi as if he were actually grateful for their good service, instead of the other way around. The donors, especially the women with deep pockets, he allows the customary kiss — one side of the cheek, and then the other. To Lady Olenna Tyrell he bestows this nicety, a smooth and decades-old dance with an old and formidable adversary and ally. Again with his granddaughter, a precocious and scheming young lady called Margaery. One kiss, and then the other before Margaery turns suddenly to dive behind in the queue and retrieve her friend.  

“Lady Sansa Stark”, she drawls, pulling her subject close to her side. “I don’t know if you realise that she works for you now.” 

He freezes when he shouldn’t, and there’s a moment of minutest hesitation before Sansa raises her chin and turns her cheek ever so subtly even as he proffers his hand to be shaken.  

Now she is confused and instantly embarrassed, and she moves hastily to take his hand while she covers over her presumption. He sees her shrinking into herself and something in her expression propels him then. He grips her hand firmly and pulls her close to him.  

Their faces bump. His roughened cheek grazes her own, and as she turns to receive the customary kiss, he dips his face. Their lips connect for a terrible, wonderful moment before they both pull away, stunned. Her face colours prettily and all he can trust himself to do is scowl.  

“Miss Stark,” he intones, dismissing her with a perfunctory nod and she scurries from him then. The queue of people jostle on but he’d be damned if he can remember much of it for the hours to come, the ghost of soft, supple lips haunting him meanwhile.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is inspired by Prompt #4 — Awkward kiss


	3. Inside

 

[ ](https://www.flickr.com/photos/162326344@N04/33827422508/in/dateposted-public/)

Joffrey had never been easy, even as a baby. He had whined and fussed and pulled at his mother's teat until it bled, and Cersei had humoured him then as she humours him now. And they are all the worse for it.  

Tywin has long lost count of the number of times he'd longed to backhand the boy across the room, so foolish, so bloody _imbecilic_ in his arrogance. A whining, spoilt, useless cunting child. It doesn't matter if Joffrey is twelve or twenty-one — crossing the legal age to get properly drunk hardly makes one a man. And Joffrey will never be a man, even if he will always be Tywin's first grandchild.  

They had managed, at least, to stave off the inevitable. To try and buy them all time. Cersei had bitched and moaned and sworn the usual vengeance and eternal hate, but the three of them — Kevan, Genna and Tywin — had managed to wrangle a temporary stay of self-execution through a single line in Robert's will and trust. And so Joffrey has had to wait four extra years before he can legally walk away from his handlers. 

But no more.  

Next year. Next year, Cersei will cease to be his legal guardian and Kevan will have to hand over the reins of the board, for Joffrey will come into his inheritance at age twenty-five and then Baratheon Enterprises will be his. All of it — Westeros in the palm of his hand. Even Lannister Towers. Renaming a building is hardly the same as legally owning it. 

It is a gruesome thought, and Tywin feels the sands of time slipping from his weathered hands.  

The afternoon depletes him. It is hard enough training a disagreeable child one has no natural affection for. Harder still when said child has a head ballooned by a lifetime's nurture of a grotesque sense of entitlement. But when the child is to inherit the most powerful seat in all of Westeros, his bratty disdain for wisdom is a strategic vulnerability they can all ill afford. 

"Leave me!" he finally barks and glares at the sulky retreating figure of the lanky golden-haired boy. _Thick-headed little cunt,_ curses Tywin darkly. _Robert Baratheon's blood and fault, for sure._

Not for the first time this afternoon, Tywin longs for a large glass of wine. Or a tall, cool glass of water. Anything to relieve this tension in his shoulders, this grating exasperation, this sinking sense of futility.  

Chella — for he remembers his Executive Assistant's name today — steps into his office almost before she is called, and Tywin thins his lips in mild approval before he rubs the crease in the middle of his eyebrows, easing the muscles there that seemed to have fused together into a permanent frown over the last two hours.    

"It's time I got a new personal aide," he says dismissively, almost as if it were an afterthought, a _non sequitur_. "You're busy enough preparing for the acquisition of Riverrun without running around for my reading glasses. I want you focused on that sale. I need a new body man. Find me an intern." 

Chella doesn't blink, nor does she remind him of how he'd sworn off personal aides after the last one. "I'll get HR to recommend me some names," she says instead. But Tywin dismisses the thought immediately with a single wave of his hand. 

"They'll send me a boy." He adds almost feverishly, "and I could really do without being near vain bags of stupid testosterone at the moment."  

"Sir, I think they always send you young men because of the nature of the job... the necessary _familiarity—_ "

"—and yet I always end up firing them," he points out coolly. With his stare, he dares her to tell him it's because he's a demanding S.O.B. A controlling, exacting taskmaster. Chella remains silent, of course. She knows what's good for her. 

He sighs. "Just... find someone who is competent and willing to learn. Someone who won't give me the shits every five minutes, try to suck up to me, bore me with their childish, ill-conceived 'plans for improvement', or worse — their gods-damn insecurity. Someone whip-smart and able to read a room and the situation, well-connected enough to know who's who and what's what. Someone— 

_who can wear a dress to match her eyes, who can stop his breath from thirty paces away, who distracts him from the humdrum and the tedium and the strife, who ties her hair in a severe bun if only to entice him to unravel it... and her._   

"I don't even care if she comes from fucking Marketing," he says now, busying himself with the latest financials from Baelish. "Just get me someone by tomorrow. Or line up three of them and I'll pick her myself." 

* * *

Things are much better and far, far worse now. She's got a brain, it turns out. And he just might be losing his own mind.

He's hardly taught her a thing all week. Hardly spoken a word to her, immersing himself as he has in his work — or at least given every appearance of doing so. And still she manages to busy herself meaningfully. He feels her watching him, observing him, _memorising_ him. He wants to read her thoughts and hear her conclusions about his person, about his ways. But he hardly speaks to her until he absolutely has to.  

Meanwhile, she learns to anticipate his needs. One week in, and she knows when to leave the room and when to enter it, how he likes to pack his bag and when to serve him lunch. She already has a preternatural sense for good wines, thanks to her pedigree. She even irons his papers in the morning, sensing perhaps that he far prefers the almost meditative act of running his expert eye over the day's news, that he enjoys the feel of the pages between his fingers, that his memory works best through touch.  

He has no delusions over whether she reads his financials when he's not looking, whether she hungrily skims the reports marked Eyes Only as she files them by order of importance in his briefcase. He's hired far more simple-minded dolts before, those quite happy to serve unquestioningly. Trustworthy and supposedly loyal. Voiceless, forgettable sheep. 

Sansa Stark is no sheep.   

Against his better judgement, against his notoriously private nature and his overdeveloped sense of self-preservation, Tywin turns now to his new personal aide who smells divinely like temptation and eyes her steadily before he tersely bites out, "You're coming back with me." 

She doesn't protest, but he sees the question in her eyes. Those blue, blue eyes. 

"It's time I showed you where I live, where things are. It'll come in handy sooner or later, I'm sure." 

He turns and leaves first, and she follows after him, shutting and locking his office without his ever needing to remind her. He does not tell her that she will be the first. That none of her predecessors have ever come this far in a year, let alone in a single distracting week.  

* * *

Sansa doesn't betray any emotion when they pull up at the sweeping entrance of the iconic Tower of the Hand, although her eyes widen fractionally at the retinue of ever-ready staff who attend to Tywin the moment they step out of the black Exelero especially bespoke to its chief passenger. She falls easily in step with him, her long slender legs matching his stride as they carve their way decisively through the original Art Deco lobby, her eyes focussed on her task ahead instead of the handpainted atlas of the world stretching across the ceiling fifteen-metres above them all.  

This time they ride the opulent elevator in silence and it is only when they arrive at the first floor of his three-storey penthouse that she comes alive once more. Tywin senses how she mentally memorises each staff member he thinks to introduce her to, how her eyes scan his home and her deceptively quick mind quietly files bits of trivia she might find useful someday. 

"Does your family live here, sir?" she asks eventually, turning to face him squarely. 

"They used to," he replies shortly, and watches as her head tilts slightly, missing nothing. He affects a mildly bored tone. "Cersei moved out with Joffrey first, then Jaime rented a small penthouse on Andal Banks when he returned." He does not mention Tyrion because he never does, not voluntarily.  

She doesn't ask why he rattles about alone in this grand old place high above the clouds. Lately, it's a question he ponders himself when the odd melancholy strikes, but then Tywin Lannister has never lived in anything less than palatial, really. Even this, with its ten bedrooms and twelve bathrooms, is modest compared to Casterly Rock back in Lannisport. After serving in the Forces for years as their commander, after slumming it in muddy fields and sleeping rough in crowded tents with his men in the blistering sun and the miserable wet, he must still come home to something like this. Tywin Lannister doubts he could put up with anything smaller. 

He shows her into his bedroom and then stands at the doorway as she asks for permission each time before she opens a door, a drawer, a window. He watches her as she whips out a tiny notebook from seemingly nowhere and makes her scribbles. Her questions are respectful and to the point. Which are his preferred suitcases. Who is the tailor he trusts to make his alterations. Does he own a spare set of reading glasses. Who can she go to for all other questions.  

She does not touch anything unless she has to, and yet something deep and low that clenches within him suddenly wishes she would. A gold cufflink. A button on his shirt front, perhaps. But of course she doesn't.

They are alone and the room falls silent as she stops. It takes him a moment too long to recognise the thoughtful pause for what it truly is now — her hesitation. It occurs to him suddenly that she has something to say. That she needs to find the words, if not the courage. 

And then — “Thank you for the dinner. Two weeks ago. Thank you for throwing all of us a party. And for letting me come.” 

He blinks. All his life, there have been sycophants and grovellers at his feet trading simpering gratitude for future favours — or so they hope. And yet it is a strangely rare thing for Tywin Lannister to be thanked so straightforwardly. He searches her face for falseness and comes up empty. He frowns.    

“It is nothing.” And he means it. It had cost him nothing and yet it had gained him a small pleasure.  

But then of course, it'd also led to something else far more perplexing later that evening. It swiftly dawns on Tywin now that she had not forgotten either.  

“I'm sorry for the confusion… at the end of the evening… when you were saying goodbye...” And as he lets his frown deepen, Sansa's words dry up. She clears her throat.  

He lets two seconds of silence fall before he trusts himself to answer her. “It had been a long and tedious night, Miss Stark,” he reminds her pointedly. “Thousands of people. I'm sure you understand how I can't possibly recall what you’re alluding to.” 

“Of course, sir.” Chastened. Bewildered.  

“Anything else you need to see in this room?” 

“Nothing else, sir. Except… Is there a medicine cabinet? Or more precisely — should I know about any medication you take?” 

Something inside him snaps shut and he straightens his back now, drawing himself to his full height. “No,” is all the answer he will give before he turns and walks away. A moment later, she shadows him down the stair and he almost regrets his shortness with her then, but he keeps his lips resolutely sealed, pressing them into a thin, grim line. 

Another long flight of stairs in silence, and then they reach the first storey and she walks herself to the front door. Ever the consummate professional, she had read the writing on the wall. 

“Is there anything else you need to show me, Mr Lannister.” 

“I think we’re done for today, Miss Stark.” 

She gives something of a stiff little bow and he knows, he _knows_ that he’s being a right arsehole now, as his Joanna used to say. The sudden recollection of his late wife is the final straw, and the very fact that this slip of a girl should be the one to elicit such a memory long buried only serves to irritate him all the more.  

“Tell me... do I scare you, Miss Stark?” he hears himself ask now, his voice pitched low and dangerously quiet.  

“Scare me, sir?” 

“Is that why you’re in such a hurry to leave?” 

She stops and he stares, fascinated in spite of his temporary contrariness, as warring emotions flicker across her face. He watches as she considers him silently, and then as if she’d finally decided her answer, he sees her draw herself taller. Again he's reminded how easy it could be to... In heels, all she has to do is tilt her face to meet his own. If she were any closer.  

“I think you know you’ve dismissed my services for the day, Mr Lannister. I can stay if you like, but I rather suspect you’d prefer I go and leave you to yourself. And no, sir,” she adds, her soft voice now hinting of steel, “you do not scare me.” 

“That disappoints me,” he replies solemnly, but he takes a single step forward, closing the gap between them. She doesn’t flinch, and it only entrances him more.  

Slowly, almost languidly, Tywin settles both his hands firm and warm on her shoulders. Slowly, almost languidly, he leans in. And this time when she raises her chin, when she cranes that beautiful neck, the angle is perfect. His silvering five o’clock shadow grazes her cheek once more as he brushes his lips across her porcelain skin. Custom dictates that this be done in a pair. First a kiss on one side, and then again on the other. And Tywin is a traditional man at heart.  

Neither of them is breathing.   

He cannot explain this uncharacteristic burst of spontaneity, least of all to himself. Was it a do-over? A tacit admission of his idiocy and the barefaced lie? Or a temporary reprieve of this raw, gnawing, constant need to touch her, perhaps. Only the gods knows, for Tywin Lannister sure as the seven hells doesn’t.  

“It is late,” he clips, avoiding her slack-jawed stare now and in another moment or two, she finally leaves his presence and it’s like the air let out of a dangerously swollen balloon. He breathes easily once more. 

There is no reasonable explanation for this. Long into the night, Tywin wonders if there isn’t also a cure. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is inspired by Prompt #6 — "I'm Sorry" Kiss.


	4. Crowd

[ ](https://www.flickr.com/photos/162326344@N04/47668248632/in/dateposted-public/)

He had left her in King’s Landing when he’d flown to Riverrun, and he had suffered for it. As it is, Tywin rarely has patience for the everyday mundanities and Chella had thus borne double the brunt of his unhappiness in Sansa’s absence. Baelish, Varys, even the aggravatingly obtuse Pycelle had tiptoed around him all week as if he were a bear with a sore tooth.  

By the end of the trip, Tywin had returned to King’s Landing strangely exhausted and longing to tear at his skin — even though progress in the Riverrun acquisition appeared more encouraging than ever. The more frustrated he got, the icier he became, his outward demeanour a counteraction to the turmoil within the man. In truth, this vague, intangible itch under his skin had flared terribly in his time away. And to think that he had been so certain a forced absence from her would sever this absurd attachment. 

The red eye had landed at five this morning and Tywin had returned to his private residence, only to leave again at half-past seven. Ordinarily he’d be in the office by now, and he’d been known at other times to drive straight to Lannister Towers from the airport. Yet common sense had insisted this time that he at least freshen up in the comfort and privacy of his own home instead of the attached bathroom in his office.  

Besides, the solitude suited him. And he will take his time this morning. He will not rush to her like a hot-blooded schoolboy.  

* * *

Chella’s usual placid face is a picture when she greets him at the lift, and Tywin is immediately on guard. 

“Mr Baratheon is here,” she informs him as neutrally as she can, and he raises an articulate eyebrow as he glances at his watch. Joffrey in the office before nine? He must want something. 

“He’s in your office,” she goes on to state the obvious but there’s something else he senses she is withholding.  

“What is it?” 

“Sansa is in there with him.” 

He nods curtly, transferring his briefcase to his left hand. In one deft twist of the nob, he pushes the solid wood door open hard so it swings wide and hits the magnetic stopper on the wall with a heavy click. 

At the sound, Joffrey jumps up and pushes Sansa away from him before he scrambles around Tywin's ebony weirwood desk to stand in front of it. The presumptuous little shit had been sitting on his leather chair. 

But that wasn’t the worst of it. Because all Tywin can think of now is where Sansa might have been positioned, relative to his reedy, thin-dicked fucktard of a grandson.  

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” Tywin’s voice cuts through the room coldly.   

“I was just resting…” Joffrey’s voice thins automatically into a whine. 

“On my chair?” Tywin raises a sardonic brow, his voice dangerously velvet.  

“I've been waiting forever! Chella told me you’d be here by eight! And yeah, you got me. I wanted to try out your chair. To be fair, it’s going to be _my_ chair next year if I want it to be, so…” Joffrey’s words fade as Tywin’s eyes narrow. 

“And you happen, of course, to be _resting_ with my assistant, were you?” 

“Sans got me a drink, yeah. And more beside.” Joffrey smirks before winking at Sansa, an ugly, shit-eating grin stretching his pretty-boy face.  

Sansa’s small, demure smile is the last straw. 

“Get out.”  

“What, who? Me or her?” 

“You cunting halfwit, of course I mean you! Get out. NOW.” 

Tywin turns to the wraparound windows and stares unseeing at the city stretched out beyond the glass. Deep breaths, deep, slow breaths as he waits for the fucker to gather his things behind his back and then hightail it from the room. Already he knows that Joffrey will speed dial Cersei the moment he steps foot outside his office doors. Tywin closes his eyes and wills himself to wrest back control, only too aware of how dangerously he sails now to an overreaction. 

He should do the smart thing. The elegant thing. The sanity-preserving thing. He should throw her out of this room. Remove every potential for foolishness. Buy the time he needs to regroup.  

He should return her to Marketing. To Winterfell.  

“Miss Stark,” he clips and already he feels a twinge when she answers.  

“Yes, sir.”  

So much for throwing her out of the room.  

“Explain yourself.” 

“I… that is, what would you like me to say, Mr Lannister?” 

He turns around sharply to face her then. A week away, and has Joffrey’s insouciance rubbed off on Sansa already? What the hell did she mean by that! 

“I mean…” she amends weakly, and then stops as she searches for the words. He waits, still not trusting himself to speak.

“I’m not sure what you’re asking me, sir,” she begins again. “Mr Baratheon had come in looking for you. I thought it my job to make him comfortable until you arrived.” 

“ _How_ comfortable?” Tywin cannot help but grit out. 

“I have always remained professional, Mr Lannister.”  

“Have you?” he replies, tilting his head towards the door. “Joffrey seems to think otherwise.” 

“Perhaps Mr Baratheon has mistaken my hospitality for something more. But I cannot help that.” 

“You can stay the hell away from him. That,” he bit out, “you can _help_.” 

A flash of something crosses her face then, and she clenches her jaw tight. When she finally speaks again, her voice is soft and neutral once more.  

“I apologise, Mr Lannister. I will insist Chella assists Mr Baratheon in future.” 

Something is not adding up. 

“How often does my grandson come up here when I’m not around?” 

“Sir?” 

“All my life, I’ve never known Joffrey to get out of bed before ten. That boy was born without a single industrious bone in his body. So I’ll ask again — how often does my grandson come up here when I’m not around?” 

“He visited your offices all last week when you were in Riverrun. We chat sometimes.” At last, the whispered confession. Tywin tightens his jaw.  

“Are you involved with my grandson?”  

“Wha—No, Mr Lannister!” 

“But you _want_ to, perhaps. Young man like him? He’s your age, isn’t he? Just slightly older?” The bitterness coats his tongue, but he presses on.  

"Blonde, green-eyed, his mother’s looks? Not a bad looking lad, I suppose. A bit skinny.” Tywin’s eyes narrow. “And rich. Rich like you’ve never tasted before. Holding the fucking keys to Westeros. The future of your family in the palm of his feckless hand. Why wouldn’t you want him.” 

That flash again, but this time he knows exactly what it is. Her eyes, if that were even possible, turn bluer still. She actually starts to clench her fist by her side, her anger plain now.   

“I’m not that kind of woman, Mr Lannister,” she grits out firmly. 

“So stop encouraging him.” Again, the memory of that small smile... 

“What do you expect me to do, sir!” she retorts sharply now. “He’s your grandson! If he wants to be here, it’s not like I can turn him away. And as you’ve pointed out, he will hold the keys to your office eventually. If he wants to talk to me, it’s not like I can just walk away or something!” 

A sudden thought strikes Tywin and he searches her face now for clues as he hisses the next question. 

“He wants to _talk_ to you, you say.” His face twists in dark displeasure. “Is that all he’s ever done to you?” 

His gut grows cold at her silence.  

“What else!” 

“He drinks sometimes. From your liquor trolley. He… doesn’t like to drink alone.” 

“What else.” 

“He tried to kiss me once. And then he got... upset when I wouldn’t. Honestly, Mr Lannister, Joffrey has been a perfect gentleman so far.“  

She’s lying, but he cannot figure out the extent of it. Joffrey is no more a gentleman than a dingo is a greyhound, Lannister blood or no. _It’s the Baratheon genetics_ , Tywin tells himself for the umpteenth time but in his gut, he _knows_ there’s a meanness there, a darkness that is all Cersei.  

He’s heard stories, of course. Turns out Joffrey can be a sadistic little crackhead on top of being a dull fuckwit. 

If Sansa's lying to him now… if he finds out that Joffrey has actually been _touching_ her… forcing himself on her… 

But what if they _are_ fucking in secret? What if it _is_ fully consensual?  

“Stay away from him,” he warns now, stepping closer to her even as his voice grows quieter. Harder. She doesn't back away but he sees in her eyes that she wants to, that she's afraid. _As she should be_. “I won’t tolerate it, do you understand me? The moment I find out the two of you are fucking, you’re _crawling_ back to Winterfell and Baratheon Enterprises can find themselves a new General Manager for the North!” 

A stunned silence falls between them as she stares up at him in disbelief and unmasked anger. Barely half a foot stands between them. He can almost hear the cogs spinning furiously in her head from here. 

“You’re scared!” she surmises suddenly and when he falls silent, she presses on, her voice growing stronger.  

“At first I thought it’s because you think I’m beneath your grandson. But then that doesn’t make sense. I’m a Stark. I may be working as your dogsbody now, but we’re Old Money. I mean, our name is even older than yours and our families go way back. So that can’t be it.” She cocks her head to the side and studies him.  

And gods help him, but he is speechless.  

“You're scared. Why.” 

He could mock her. Coldly dismiss her from his presence. Fire her for insubordination and gross impertinence, and send her packing. Anything. Anything at all. 

Tywin Lannister stays rooted to the spot. This slip of a girl, and how she cuts to the heart of things. 

“I’m not _scared_.” He grounds the last word between his teeth with contempt. “But you’d be a fool to get involved with my grandson.” 

“Because he’s scheduled for greatness?” 

“Because he’s a prick!” He spits the last now. How many times over the decades had he drilled into his own children the importance of placing family above all else, and yet here he is rubbishing his own flesh and blood.  

Because of _her_. 

“Joffrey is a brat. Uncontrolled, stupidly cruel even.” 

“I’m a grown woman, Mr Lannister.” 

He snorts. “Says the child.” 

She shakes her head. “Even my father isn’t this protective.” 

“Just as well,” he replies thickly, “I’m not your father.” 

Two hands, large and warm, close around her heart-shaped face as he lowers his own into a crushing kiss. He feels her freeze and then shudder. And for a terrible second he wonders if he repels her.  

And then he feels her soften as she melts against his frame for a moment. Just a moment. 

The intercom sounds, its dull beep jolting them both and Tywin breaks free from her, gripping the edge of the table as he catches his breath, as he wills the room to stop spinning. 

He hears her gasp beside him, and he doesn’t yet know what that means. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is inspired by Prompt #26 — Jealous kiss.


	5. Close

[ ](https://www.flickr.com/photos/162326344@N04/47749559021/in/dateposted-public/)

“What is it.”  

“They’re coming up in two minutes, sir.” 

“This about the Greyjoy ships?” He cusses under his breath but Chella hears it anyway. 

“We’ve already moved this six times, sir.” 

He squeezes his eyes shut. “Three minutes,” he snaps and hangs up on her. 

_Regroup. Recover. Regain control._

Tywin feels Sansa move behind him, probably already making her way out. Three minutes — barely enough time to prepare him for his next meeting. They’d both lost time. They’d both lost track. And other things beside. 

He turns, glancing at her from the corner of his eye. She’s already filling the crystal water pitcher, her hurried footsteps muffled on the carpet as she sets up the room. Now she’s lowering the blinds so the sun doesn’t blind them as it creeps up the azure sky. Now she’s deftly unpacking his briefcase. Her soft perfume drifts past his nose with the to and fro, and it’s all he can do now not to turn and kiss her again. Taste her again.  

She comes over to him now and his breath stills as she cleans his reading glasses before slipping her hand under the front of his suit jacket to tuck them into the inside pocket. She presses the front edge of his jacket, smoothing it down his shirt front.  

She might as well have branded him with an iron.  

She drops her hand and lets it fall to her side. Her gaze is fixed resolutely on the front of his crisp white shirt and neither of them moves, even as the air seems to crackle in the silence. Her breathing has changed. His has as well. And still she will not look at him. 

But he’s fascinated as she reaches out with her right hand, skimming the air above his lapel for what seems like forever before he feels the lightest pressure of her touch. She traces the dark pinstripe, her fingertips travelling the length of the grain as it slowly skims up the fabric and he stays rooted, his face immutable, his heart pounding hard in his ears. 

One minute. Maybe even less.   

“Miss Stark…” he starts, but gets nowhere. She raises her head then and presses herself sweetly into him, those soft lips meeting his own as she lifts the back of her heels and kisses him. 

Silence as time and breath and heartbeat skip. The old lion closes his eyes. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is inspired by Prompt #28 — First (real) kiss.
> 
> I know it's short, but there's a longer one coming up tomorrow. :-)


	6. Distance

 

 

[ ](https://www.flickr.com/photos/162326344@N04/46833318245/in/dateposted-public/)

A press, a release, and he feels her pull back from him. 

Time stands perfectly still as his mind is first blown wide, then blinded by the magnitude of that tiny moment so he cannot open his eyes. Tywin Lannister stands there unmoving, his usually hawkish green-gold eyes squeezed shut as precious seconds drip like melted gold. 

And then he lets out his breath as he opens his eyes slowly, taking an instinctive step towards her as he slips his arms around her little waist, as he pulls her to him and feels her mould into his frame. One small, stunning kiss when she lifts her shy chin, and then they pull back once more, staring into each other’s face in wonder. 

It is only for the minutest instant. 

In a flash, his mouth covers her own, their teeth clash, and heated tongues meet and search and find. He kisses her hard, desperately, bending her into a bow as he grips the back of her shirt so they bunch in his large hands. Sansa clings to him like a vine, her hands splayed across his broad shoulders, her hot little mouth matching his in urgency as the tiniest sigh slips from the back of her throat and fills his cock mightily.  

Screaming silence all around them, and in his head he knows he’s never wanted anyone quite like this.  

Three dull beeps from the phone and they drop back to earth, landing heavily as Chella calmly informs them of his visitors through the intercom. “Come in!” he commands, his hoarse voice betraying their recklessness. Sansa is desperately tucking the back of her shirt into her sleek pencil skirt, the telltale flush of her cheeks, her neck heating him up anew. Then Tywin’s visitors file in, and he invites them all to sit with a wordless gesture to his couches, noting unhappily how Cersei had turned up uninvited and brought Joffrey along without his expressed consent. 

None of them pays Sansa any attention, save Joffrey who smirks at Sansa then wets his lips like a sophomoric pervert. Too much, it appears, having first the grandfather and then the grandson make their darker desires plain; Sansa looks suddenly ill and Tywin dismisses her coolly from the room as a mercy, requesting that Chella enters in her stead.  

* * *

Two things displease Tywin instantly. The first is the presence of Euron Greyjoy.

The second is his fucking hand on his daughter’s knee. 

“I was expecting your brother. Or your niece,” Tywin begins without preamble, staring at the notoriously mercurial blowhard privateer before him. The implication is clear: _anyone else but you would have been tolerable. Even ball-less Theon._

A shit-eating grin splits Euron's face open and Tywin is regrettably reminded of Joffrey in that instant, which only deepens his distaste for the man. “Balon is… ah… indisposed, Mr Lannister. And Yara has... left the family business to pursue other projects.” 

He seems particularly amused with this last explanation and Tywin narrows his eyes. “I had expected the head of Ironborn Merchant Marine to be present at this meeting, seeing how your brother has been trying to court our favour for a while.” 

“Balon is no longer… ah… our brave and fearless leader, Tywin.” 

This is news to him and he shoots his daughter a piercing look before he returns his shrewd gaze to the younger Greyjoy.  

“When did this happen? And how?” 

“I believe they call it a coup, father,” Cersei drawls softly. Euron’s hand had crept further up her leg in full view of Tywin, and Cersei neither encourages nor dissuades that snake's lascivious climb. And Tywin will not take the bait. He’d gladly have the man’s head and cock on a chopping block later, in a manner of speaking. But the last thing Tywin would deign to give the fucker right now is the satisfaction of riling the famed old lion of Westeros. Nor will he give his daughter the attention she seems so desperate to extract from him.  

And then Joffrey pipes up. 

“I’ve read the contract, grandfather!” He casts an uncertain glance at his mother who returns a beatific smile. “I’ve even changed it,” Joffrey goes on to say, emboldened now and even proud. “Euron tells mum… that is, _Mrs Baratheon,”_ he remembers belatedly, "that it works out a lot better for us if we bought half the fleet outright instead of just two ships for now. The _Silence_ has already proven itself in the last year. I mean, yeah, right? It makes sense...?” 

The galling, gullible, _foolish_ walking liability he has to call Grandson starts to shrink into the Chesterfield as his little speech comes to its lame close and Tywin stares down at the wretched whelp until he finally shuts his gob and shrugs helplessly at his mother. _I tried,_ he mouths soundlessly for the room to see and Tywin has to grit his teeth to stop from punching the irredeemable halfwit until he stops bloody _twitching_.  

_Calm_ , he tells himself. _Control_.  

_Her mouth fitting into his. Her tongue, sweet and hot. A sigh of unmistakable pleasure—_

The moment Euron leaves the room and Tywin is sure that Chella will escort him politely out of the building, Tywin turns on his flesh and blood. 

“What the _fuck_ was that!" 

“Joffrey makes a reasonable point, I thought. And I, for one, am proud of him!” Cersei hisses, standing to face off her father. 

“Dealing with that vicious fucker just now,” he growls, pointing at the doorway that Euron just walked out of, "is no more Joffrey's idea than it was Yara’s to cede control to her ambitious uncle. Your Joffrey couldn’t lead a lemming off a cliff, daughter. If either of you even has a sliver of  _coup d’œil_ between you, you would have immediately seen what a fatal mistake it is to bring that eel in.”

“ _My Joffrey_ is also _your grandson_ , father!” Cersei reminds him needlessly. Her voice has deepened to a husk not unlike Tywin’s own when he digs deep for control and dominance. _Frostier and frostier_.

“He had no business looking that contract over on his own, let alone making those unilateral decisions,” Tywin snaps. "Thank the Seven his signature still means nothing now!” 

“But that’s not for long, is it father.” Cersei’s emerald green eyes flash. “Tick tock, and in nine months, eight days and ooh, fourteen hours… we both have to call Joffrey ‘Boss’.” 

She smiles triumphantly up at him but Tywin sees right through her. The bravado is but wafer thin and his disdain and exasperation for the both of them is palpable. She smiles, but she’s uncertain now. 

“Leave us,” he turns to Joffrey without looking at him and jerks his head to the door. Both Cersei and Tywin watch as the manchild fairly scrambles out the room, only too glad to leave his mother to fight his battles. 

“You’re cleverer than your son,” he concedes. “But that is hardly high praise. Joffrey is not ready. You must see that.” 

“I do not, father. He is a Lannister. If only you took the time—“ 

“He is half Baratheon!” Tywin almost shouts, banging his fist on the weirwood at long last. The gold fountain pen that Joanna had engraved after his third major acquisition startles from its holder. But Cersei remains unmoved. He sighs wearily. “Joffrey is not ready. Yes, you are smarter than your son. And yet nowhere as clever as you think you might be.” 

Hurt crosses his daughter’s face and Tywin grits his teeth once more. The pain he inflicts is necessary. Their collective survival depends on it, and the sooner he rids them both of their misplaced hubris, the better. 

“You forget history too easily, Cersei. But history informs character and maps the routes that man will inevitably take and take again. History is a great teacher, and you'd do well not to overlook its lessons.  

"So let me remind you that it was Euron who crippled Lannisport and almost threatened Casterly Rock when Balon betrayed our partnership and decided to go rogue twelve years ago. It was Euron who did the dirty, and he did such a thorough, ruthless job of it that he devastated a quarter of our maritime investments. Fifteen thousand people lost their jobs that day. I’d trust him as far as I can throw him in the Sunset Sea." 

He gazes at Cersei steadily, his mouth curving down with the bitterness of the next admission.  

"And then there's your profligate dead husband. Need I remind you, daughter, that Baratheon Enterprises is still in our debt — my debt! — to the order of _eighteen billion dragons_. You may think it all comes out in the wash with Lannister gold. It doesn't work that way, or at least I'll never allow it. So don't depend on it, you and Joffrey. Your golden weasel inherits the keys to power but he still needs to pay the debt." 

"He's a Lannister!” Cersei splutters. "The money will be his eventually anyway, just as it will be mine..." _When you are dead_ , the remaining words hang unsaid.  

"He's a _Baratheon,"_ Tywin corrects her. _"_ And that kind of wishful prodigal stupidity is _exactly_ what will set both Houses on a race to the bottom!" 

He narrows his eyes and stares at his daughter. “As for any amorous affection the eel might profess to have for you, close your legs, woman. Don’t whore yourself out for a shite deal _ever_ , least of all to a perverse reprobate like Euron." 

At that, Cersei lets out a small, bitter laugh. "You mean like how you whored me out to Robert? You had no qualms playing my pimp then!"  

"That was a strategic match of equals."  

"I despised him," she shot back with venom. “He was a pig of a man and sharing his bed was hell but you didn't care. Family!" Cersei gives a shout of laughter. "I am your _only_ _daughter_ but you ordered me like I was the help. Well this time, _I choose_ who I will deal with. I know what I'm doing."  

"You think you are cold and clever. You think this will not hurt you, that you hold the cards. You will be wrong. Women always hurt because they are inherently more vulnerable and bottom feeders like Euron will use you and then kick you aside like a soiled condom. Besides which, you are a _Lannister_. And we never stoop to whores, ever.” 

Cersei lifts her chin and stares balefully into her father’s eyes. 

“You’re wrong, father.” She smiles and it is an ugly, horrid smile so incongruous with the rest of her mother’s stunning beauty. “Joffrey is ready, and I will be there for him in the times when he is uncertain. You’re too arrogant and controlling to ever let the reins go. To ever admit that some of us have brilliant ideas of our own. That we are ruthless and decisive and sure — just like _you_ , father. I hope to the gods that you live long enough to eat your own words. But some days, I just wish you would drop d—" 

A timid knock on the door pricks his ears and the recognition of its particular rhythm smooths his forehead instantly.  

“What is it, Sansa,” he invites sternly when she opens the door. “Couldn’t you use the intercom?” 

“Your next appointment is waiting outside,” is all she says in reply. He looks at her and then nods his consent and tacit approval. Glancing at her neatly handwritten note, he realises that she’s intuited the need for discretion. Euron is apparently still in the building, having inveigled his way in and somehow eluded Chella. Tywin’s next appointment, on the other hand, must never know that Euron had been here to talk ships. 

Clever girl.  

It is appalling how Sansa improves his mood so drastically, how he almost forgets the immediate issue plaguing his mind, how quickly his thoughts turn carnal. His focus pinpoints to the acute need to pick up where they had left off barely an hour ago. 

She is distracting. Utterly, utterly distracting.  

Abruptly, he turns now to his daughter and realises that she’s watching him as he watches Sansa, a contemplative look on her face.  “We’re done here,” he informs his daughter coolly, nodding to the door. “And I mean it — see that you don’t think to invite yourself and Joffrey to any more of my meetings until my expressed permission. Do you understand me, Cersei.” 

Another long stare before she turns on her heel, stalking out the door. 

* * *

The day passes swiftly after that, compounded by the events of the morning that only serve to plague his mind for the rest of the day. _Cersei. Joffrey. Cersei again. Euron._

_Miss Stark._

She’s in and out of his office constantly, as she always has done. And before, he’d already felt her presence whenever she was near and secretly welcomed it. But now, every sense feels heightened, every nerve at attention. The worst of it is his mind and how it blanks now. How every instinct takes over if he so much as catches her scent so all he wants to do is lock them in his office and— 

Even then, the way forward seems unclear to him. Of course, there is a fundamental keening where the baser man wants to sheath himself in her fresh, dewy cunt and lose his mind for fifteen glorious seconds. And it’s probably not a bad idea — assuage the lust and get it over and done with. Remove the temptation and thus the distraction. 

Except it is his deeper suspicions that nibble incessantly now at the corners of his mind. She _beguiles_ him. Captivates him and holds his attention. It _pleases_ him to simply watch her, to hear her connect the dots in three short leaps, to understand when her silence is speaking volumes. When he recognises her play; when he realises how deftly she handles his trickier appointments, his clients… it strangely warms him.  

Cersei thinks arrogance is power and power is seductive. It is not, he darkly surmises. Elegance and hidden depths, however…  

Tywin rubs his forehead irritably. It is foolishness. _This_ is foolishness. Him, here, mulling over Ned’s girl for the umpteenth time like an infatuated whelp when he can ill afford to sleep five hours each night as it is. If the events of the morning have proven anything to him, it is how things have started to slip past his notice. He will have words with Varys later on. Petyr will get it too. But Tywin wonders now if he shouldn’t also practise what he preaches. 

Self-sacrifices are always needed when you’re building a legacy that lasts.  

Chella enters his room as instructed — alone. She shuts the door behind her and waits for him to make up his mind, which he does after a full minute’s silence. 

“Concerning Miss Stark,” he says blandly, returning to the contract he was marking out with a blood-red pen. “See that she doesn’t come in tomorrow.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is inspired by Prompts #64 "Being unable to open eyes for a few moments" and #65 "One Small Kiss, Pulling Away For An Instant, Then Devouring Each Other"
> 
>  
> 
> And if I don't say this enough, forgive me — thank you so much for sharing this journey and dropping your squees along the way. Writing with company is always so much sweeter. xx


	7. Adherence

 

[ ](https://www.flickr.com/photos/162326344@N04/40805323013/in/dateposted-public/)

At least he can think more clearly now, he grimaces. It was the same in Riverrun — that strange disequilibrium as if he'd suddenly been freed of invisible cords except now he feels cut adrift and longs to be moored.  

In Riverrun at least, he had made every effort to suppress his... partiality for her. And he hadn't kissed yet her then. At least not the way he would have liked. 

But now he's bought himself the time — at least for a little while — to take stock of matters with a cold, clinical eye. The answer seems obvious in itself, of course: he needs to remove her. He can ill afford the diversion in these crucial months, and to take it any further would be impractical to the extreme. They work too closely together as it is, and even though Tywin is above the law he created in the first place, he still stands by his own company policy banning office romances — not that _this_ could ever be classed as anything that maudlin or permanent. It would be injudicious in the extreme for him to dip his pen in the company ink, particularly for a dalliance that couldn’t possibly last.   

_Just bed her and get it over with!_

_And if you should want more?_

_Put in controls. Set an expiration date. Have an exit strategy._

_And if you should still want more? If it should go beyond this?_

No. There can be no _beyond_. It would be ludicrous, _ludicrous,_ to put into words any sort of attachment after this. It's a forty-year age gap, for the gods' sake. He finds his own offspring exasperatingly immature and tedious as it is.  

And yet. 

He hadn't looked at Sansa's desk as he stalked past Chella this morning. But now he glares at his closed doors as if the vision of her might materialise before him. Posture perfect, face so serious, fingers flying over the keyboard. Ankles crossed and tucked under her chair like a schoolgirl.  

A close-up now as she stops and thinks, biting down gently on the end of a pencil. The image morphs and it's his finger now, brushing her lips, slipping into her sweet wet mouth as her teeth graze his knuckle and her lips close over his... 

Tywin leans back heavily in his chair and tosses his pen on the table. Hopeless. This is a sickness that needs curing.   

“Chella!” he booms and waits as she makes her way post haste to his office. 

“Anything I can help you with, Mr Lannister.” 

“Bring Sansa in. I need her after all.” 

His assistant startles a little and when she finally replies, her voice trembles slightly with the aggravating notes of confusion.  

“Sir… you told me to let her go!” 

“What are you mumbling about.” 

“Yesterday…” Chella shakes her head and Tywin steeples his long fingers in front of him, pressing them to relieve his growing agitation. 

“You said you didn’t want her to come in tomorrow — today!” 

“And that is what I meant precisely.” 

She shakes her head again, almost as if she cannot believe her bad luck. “It’s just that… that is what you said to me with the others. I just thought…” 

His look must have said enough because Chella falls silent now.  

“Where is she,” he asks softly.   

“Back with Marketing… I’ll run and get her!” 

Tywin watches as his usually phlegmatic assistant flees the room and it is then that he closes his fist. It is disconcerting, but an error that is easy enough to rectify… 

“Sir—“ she taps on his door barely two minutes later and this time when he looks up from his reading, he realises that Chella has paled considerably. 

“Sir,” she almost whispers hoarsely, “Marketing informs me that Sansa has left.” 

“Left?” His face hardens. 

“She tendered her resignation effective immediately, and I’m not sure if she was pushed or if she chose to leave herself — no one will give me a straight answer… Sir, what would you like me to do next?” 

“Fix this fucking mess and bring back my aide.” 

She flees the room again and Tywin gives up all pretense of productivity now. He finds Joffrey lurking at his mother’s and hauls him back into his office so as not to waste his foul humour. It is a sluggish eighty minutes before he hears Chella return. 

“Where is she.” 

His beleaguered assistant swallows and something in Tywin’s gut contracts a fraction.  

“Speak up, woman!”  

“I’ve been told that Sansa has left King’s Landing.” 

“She _what?_ ” 

Chella visibly quails then, flinching when he stands up abruptly from his desk. Mercifully Joffrey had made his excuses the moment he could, so there is no other witness now to his private displeasure and mounting unease. Except for the messenger.  

“The timeline, Chella.” 

“I informed her of your decision last night, and I guess she—“ 

“You informed her? What did you say.” 

“That you didn’t want her to come back to the office tomorrow — I mean, today!” 

“And she obviously took it to mean the same as you had?” 

“That you meant for her never to return? Yes.” She palms her skirt and Tywin stares at the smudged watermarks as he struggles for composure.

“Go on.” 

“We think she made her decision to leave last night, because she had given her notice to Marketing through email shortly after we spoke. She lives alone, but her landlord said that she paid ahead for the remainder of her lease, and they saw her leave just an hour ago with luggage—“ 

“How many pieces.” 

“Sir?” 

“HOW MANY PIECES OF LUGGAGE, Chella.” 

Another whisper. “I didn’t ask, Mr Lannister.” 

_An hour,_ he thinks, his lips thinning as he stares at the clock.  

“Retrieve her,” he tells Chella now. “Chances are, she’s flying back to her folks. Take my car and fetch her from the airport — it’s got immunity from the coppers. And if she resists, tell her that her resignation is rejected.  

“And then tell her she needs to come back to my office and fucking explain herself because no one —  _no one! —_ quits on me. _I_ decide who damn well leaves me, not the other way around!"  

* * *

The wait. The interminable wait. 

Three scenarios.  

One, Chella misses Sansa somehow although if she truly did, then he will most definitely fire his sorry excuse of an assistant because he had personally called to delay that plane’s departure. 

Two, Chella finds her but fails to persuade her. Sansa leaves for Winterfell anyway, in which case Tywin’s next move is to insist that she return to King’s Landing to properly finish a security clearance process. Ned hates breaking rules, so he’ll lean on him to get to the daughter. 

Three, Chella brings her— 

A soft click on his door and Tywin spins round from his well-worn spot at the east windows of his office. There is a stunned silence as they both lock eyes across the spacious room. As the hope of her standing in his presence once more is finally realised and made flesh.  

He breaks first, but only for a ghost of a second. When he crosses to her, his strides are long and sure and she meets him halfway, slipping instantly into his arms, her mouth fitting into his as they cling to one another desperately, urgently. 

“What are we going to do?” Sansa whispers. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is inspired by Prompt #11 — "I almost lost you" kiss.


	8. Layers

 

[ ](https://www.flickr.com/photos/162326344@N04/32852396627/in/dateposted-public/)

 

They each appear lost in far-flung corners of their respective inner worlds. King’s Landing is a blur, her gaudy glitter fading as the yawns of amber street lights grow wider with each country mile. And still Vylarr drives on, having long learnt the way by heart so he could almost chauffeur them blind. The silence is familiar and strangely comforting, the darkness in the Maybach now velvet and soft, the delicate scent of her tickling his nose to disturbing distraction. 

Tywin squints until the grand dame swings into view. Already lights in the manor have started to flicker on and by the time Vylarr opens their door, the housekeeping staff are assembled and waiting. Tywin waves them away brusquely and their collective gaze drops obediently to the floor at once. They scatter before they can lay eyes on Sansa, who trails behind him now like a willowy shadow.

He had wondered what he would do, whether he would offer her the scotch for a short nightcap, as is his occasional habit. But he finds himself striding past his study now and by the time he reaches the corridor to his bedroom, her hand is in his, her footsteps quickening to match him, his determination roaring in his ears.

The lights by his bed are already dimmed to a low, soft glow and his eyes are not what they used to be. But this only serves to heighten the other senses — the feel of her warm smooth skin, for instance, against his large roughened hands. The fit and weight of her breast in his palm, the pattern of white lace between them and little more. How the barest notes of her favourite perfume wrap his face now like soft Lysene pashmina. How her breath shallows when he presses his lips to the little hollow behind her ear. 

He peels these layers off her urgently, efficiently. Vaguely aware of how she matches him still. Shirt for shirt. A tie, a ribbon, a vest, a bra. The quiet purr of zips. Urgent, determined, slightly trembling hands as they each divest the other of their sartorial impediments between long snatches of locked lips. Time moves sluggish and swift, and the room spins and stills.

He had thought he couldn’t wait to sink himself into her. He had been certain he would ravish her roughly, thoroughly. That he would slake this seemingly bottomless thirst for her once and for all. But then she stands before him, naked and open. And gods help him, but he’s fascinated by her curiosity and wonder. How she reaches out now to touch the hairs on his chest. How she traces the plane of muscle, still well-defined and yet marked with unflinching proof of the ravages of time. 

She presses her lips to the spot just above his right nipple and he sucks his teeth involuntarily before he cups her face with both his hands and sups fully from her mouth, her lips already swollen from countless such punishing, searching kisses. Slowly he drops her on his bed before stretching himself along the length of her lithe, flawless body. She kisses his eyes so they close, grazes her lips against his ear so he shudders. He sinks his teeth softly into her neck and hears her moan. 

He had imagined, countless of times now, the heated clash of bodies as he drills her repeatedly into his bed. Relentless. Methodical. He had long predicted a short frenzy, furious and violent like a flash storm. But he turns her over on her front now and takes his time with it as he slips the pins from her hair, as he shakes her mane loose so it covers her bare back, a lemony plume of her shampoo released into the still night air. He drapes her thick locks over one shoulder and languidly strokes the length of her spine till he feels her skin pebble. 

“Are you feeling cold?” he asks without waiting for an answer. Instead, he kisses his way down her back, the rough bristles of his cheeks grazing the gentle crest of her buttocks. Slowly he spreads her legs, coaxes her to her knees, and breathes her musk in. He feels himself harden almost to the point of pain.

He had imagined... But now he surprises himself. 

The Old Lion of Westeros presses his face to the mouth of her river and gently starts to lap.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is inspired by Prompts #12-15 — Kiss on the nose, Kiss on the neck, Kiss on the ear, Kiss on the back


	9. Shatter

[ ](https://www.flickr.com/photos/162326344@N04/47779914112/in/dateposted-public/)

At first she is so quiet, it’s almost disconcerting. Yet he persists, alternating long strokes of his tongue with quick, deft flicks until she sighs. But it’s when he gently suckles her pearl that he gets her fullest attention. 

He flips her on her back now, splaying her like a dewy orchid as he pins her long legs down on either side of his head. Again he teases her, his lips pressed carefully around her swollen bud of nerves and he nibbles softly before pulling slowly away, dragging from her long pale throat a low and obscene note of pleasure. Again he does this and then again, and this time she cries out as she lifts her buttocks high off the sheets, pushing greedily into his mouth, all reservations well and truly forsaken now.   

She’s starting to pant, her words whispered and pleading as he works her skillfully, persistently, and without mercy. “Please…” she gasps and he feels her searching and yearning, her eyes squeezed shut as she presses her face into the pillow. “I need...” And the words vanish again as another cry is ripped from her throat.   

And he presses and waits, never varying the pitch of his performance as he works her to a fever. Timing is everything whether in business or in bed. And Tywin has always relished picking the perfect moment to strike. 

“May I?” she suddenly asks, her voice high and airy. Beseeching. “Please… M-M-May I come?” 

_May I—!_

He had thought no one could surprise him anymore. 

“Yes,” he growls his permission as he sinks his fingers into her. Barely two seconds and he watches unblinking as she falls apart, her thighs clamping his wrist as she writhes and sobs even as he draws out her pleasure, his long blunt fingers stabbing her steadily, his eyes hooded and dark. She is a work of art, he thinks, even when she unravels. His cock starts to leak from jealousy. 

Her hands are clumsy and impatient when she helps him with the prophylactic. She's still shaky from her climax even as she earnestly works the thin material down his length and he has to grit his teeth from the grasp of her warm hand on him. He is already unbearably close and he’s barely touched her, really.  

“Kiss me,” she whispers as he stares down. “Please.” And he obliges, his mouth gentle even as he pushes deep into her. He watches as her eyes roll back before her lids slide close, as she bites her lower lip when he slams the last of his length, sheathing himself fully in her. And then it is he who has to squeeze his eyes shut as he holds his position, as he wrestles together what little tatters remain of his control, as he wills himself to ignore the perfect fit of her.  

He eventually reopens his eyes to find her staring up at him wordlessly and when she laces her hands around his neck, he knows instinctively _how_ she wants him now. 

And so he takes her — thoroughly, roughly, almost violently even as something within him softens against his will. But still he pummels her, plunders her, his own control barely holding by a thread as he claims her bodily at long fucking last.  

The moment she melts, the moment he feels her clenching helplessly around his cock, he spills into her, a deep anguished groan mingling with her strangled cry. Tywin rolls away from her suddenly, swallowing the last of his feral outburst as his throat clamps shut. 

A silence heavy as a winter blanket falls over the room now and there is a hush as his heartbeat slows to what he hopes is normal. He feels her turn on her side to face his back. It takes him a full minute before he trusts himself enough to turn and face her, as he should.  

Sansa Stark stares into his face now, her expression perhaps a mirror of his own. Solemn. Unsmiling. Gaze unflinching and withholding truth. But then suddenly her face breaks into a smile so small and tender that he leans in unthinkingly and presses his lips to hers. This time he lets her deepen the kiss, one long leg stealing across under the sheets now to twine around his own. She holds his face to hers with one slender hand and when she finally breaks away from him, her sigh is one of contentment that he secretly shares. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is inspired by Prompt #42 — Sated kiss.


	10. Spin

[ ](https://www.flickr.com/photos/162326344@N04/47801488832/in/dateposted-public/)

He hears her the moment the public elevator doors open. Chella isn’t in yet and he waits patiently in his chair while she settles in. While she turns the computer on, perhaps. Opens the blinds. Gets the coffee machine going. 

He turns the page and waits another two minutes until he hears the soft tones of the passcode to his door.

“You’re already in!” Sansa seems surprised, but then he hadn’t turned on the room light. The marble table lamp had served him well enough even two hours ago when the sky was still dark. In truth, Tywin had hardly slept since Vylarr drove her home earlier this morning. Thank the gods that work had finally silenced the showreel constantly replaying in his head.

How she sounded. Tasted. How she had felt in his hands. 

“The usual coffee, Mr Lannister?” And their day continues. Later Chella walks in at half past seven, a little flustered to find them both long settled into the morning before her. It’s an unusual day, in that they’re all running on time for a change. And at every turn, he resists the urge to overcompensate. To sternly tell her off in front of Chella, for instance. To ride her exceptionally hard if only to mask his darker preferences. And so the next best thing for it is to simply ignore her, as she manages to ignore him. Sansa comes into his room as she always does — all politeness and efficiency. But now she faces him without really looking at him. Her eyes never seem to meet his own.

Yet he _knows_ now. He had felt her. He had glimpsed into her in the afterglow and felt the change shift and slide between them in the shadows. This careful avoidance now is no coquetry, or even regret — merely the natural result of her sagacity. They have not put a name to this. Maybe they never will. And though he had bared himself to her for a blink of time, she is hardly one to flaunt and strut thus. He prizes her discretion more than ever now. Is almost quietly proud of it.

“A private call, sir…” Chella calls in now. “It’s your granddaughter.”

Myrcella phones every year on the same date without fail and with seemingly little cause, though Tywin knows better. Ever since she was old enough to understand anniversaries, this sentient child had made it a point to remember the late grandmother she never met, simply by never speaking of her to her widower. Myrcella would call from all parts of the world, filling his ears with the banal gossip of her youth and he will silently indulge her. He always does. And she never forgets, not a single year.

This time he truly listens now, even as he stares unseeing into the distance. Somehow his gaze manages to fall on the slender neck of his aide, her thick auburn hair twisted today in a chignon. And it dawns on him that Sansa is two years younger than his own granddaughter.

He hangs up very shortly after and stands up abruptly, suddenly irritable. By and by he wanders over to the east windows, stares at the kingdom before him and then closes his eyes as if suddenly exhausted. 

 _She can't still be in your system, surely. It’s hardly sustainable._ Though bloody convenient. She’s ten steps away. _You’d humiliate the man who so much as looks at Myrcella wrong. And you’d bankrupt him if he were even half your age..._

“Sir… I’ll need to set up your room.”

Tywin doesn’t turn when Sansa slips inside soundlessly, having long learnt now how to read his silences. The door closes slowly behind her and when he hears it slide shut, he turns without warning and catches her fingers, pulling her hard to him now so she curls into his arms.

 _Too bloody convenient by half._ She smiles up at him shyly, looking straight into his eyes for the first time today. Her heels are punishingly high so all he has to do is bend his head a fraction to taste her.

It strikes him that it’s been decades since he’s gone away on a proper holiday.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another short one for now, though I suspect the next one might be longer and rather more indulgent. 
> 
> This chapter is inspired by Prompt #19 — Shy kiss.


End file.
